


The Worst of Me

by flibbertygigget



Category: Rick and Morty
Genre: Episode: s03e08 Morty's Mind Blowers, Gen, Suicidal Thoughts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-24
Updated: 2017-10-24
Packaged: 2019-01-22 06:54:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 396
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12475896
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flibbertygigget/pseuds/flibbertygigget
Summary: Rick will never let Morty know, or at least will never let him remember, just how crafted his existence is.





	The Worst of Me

Rick will never let Morty know, or at least will never let him remember, just how crafted his existence is.

Not only the things that Rick lets him remember, but the memories themselves, hidden in their color-coded vials where no one but Rick can really see them. He edits them, creating a narrative, creating sense and morals for when Morty will eventually see them again, permanently. A snip here, a cut there. Morty doesn't need to know.

Rick doesn't let himself forget the edits. He could, of course, but... well, he can. He can remember, even if Morty doesn't have to, and in a way he feels that it's important to do so.

Morty doesn't need to feel the dizzying edge of suicide, but it keeps Rick on his guard. Morty doesn't need to see Rick hurling, his stomach shrunk from the months that the damn bugs barely fed him, but Rick treasures the panic it inspired in his grandson. Morty doesn't need the bullshit, the times Beth drunkenly accused him of trying to steal her father from her or the times Jerry said he'd never have a job either or the times Rick was cruel, more cruel than his usual, cruel enough to make Morty want to leave, cruel enough to find ways to make Morty stay. But Rick needs the bullshit, needs to know where the lines lay before damage became irreversible and began to leave scars, needs a trial and error guide on how to stay.

Rick is getting better at staying. Maybe that's why Morty is growing up, growing hard, because Rick isn't fucking up enough to keep him innocent. There are incidents that that Rick allowed to stay that would have been erased before, moments that stuck with Morty and made him strong. There are moments that Rick didn't know about until it's too late, until they're already burned into Morty's neural pathways irreversibly, because Morty doesn't tell him when it hurts anymore.

(Rick wonders if there was some memory that made Morty stop telling him, but somehow he knows it was a foregone conclusion.)

Rick can't reverse the changes in Morty, the hardness that scares him if he thinks about it too hard, but he can do this. He can edit, and he can remember. Maybe, if he does it right, he'll blow Morty's mind and the frightening hardness away.


End file.
